


the history books forgot about us

by anonemone



Category: Marvel 616
Genre: Alternate Universe - Reincarnation, Canonical Character Death, M/M, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-14
Updated: 2017-01-14
Packaged: 2018-09-17 08:53:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9314423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anonemone/pseuds/anonemone
Summary: "I can't do that with this brain. I can't forget anything," Rhodey says, and Ares pretends his smile is because of this human's folly, and not because of the irony of it all."Ha. You almost make me feel young again," he says.What he doesn't say:Please, Beloved. Remember me.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Shout out to [TheOneWhoWantsForgotten](http://archiveofourown.org/users/TheOneWhoWantsForgotten/pseuds/TheOneWhoWantsForgotten) for helping me make this readable <3

"I can't do that with this brain. I can't forget anything," Rhodey says, and Ares pretends his smile is because of this human's folly, and not because of the irony of it all.

"Ha. You almost make me feel young again," he says.

What he doesn't say:  _ Please, Beloved. Remember me. _

 

As a young god, he walked the earth a lot.

Part of it was the rush of knowing he was above them all, stronger and faster and more powerful by far.

But the truth was, the earth was refreshing. Olympus exhausted him, sometimes, with all the infighting and power plays. Humans were altogether more, well,   _ quaint _ . He was much more optimistic, back then; and something about the humans reminded him of why that was.

It was, of course, folly to fall for a human. Playing with them was fine--his father did  _ that  _ often enough, to the dangerous fury of his mother. But actually  _ falling _ \--that never ended well. He knew that much. But as Athena often ridiculed him for, he wasn't really one to listen to his head.

They were a constant presence on the battlefield, always the shining hero who held everybody in rapt attention. Really, what else was Ares to do?

Ares decides-- _ they are my Champion _ . (What Ares doesn’t know: at that same moment, he cemented their fate. War was never meant to love a human.)

It’s an arrow from one of their own soldiers that gets them. Friendly fire.

He cradles them in his arms as they die.

Somewhere, Aphrodite is laughing.

 

Ares should have known from the epithet. King Memnon:  _ son of the dawn, _ they call him, the warrior king who came from across desert and sea.

It was not until he sees him walk through the gates of Troy, from his place in Olympus, that Ares knows: it was  _ them _ . His Champion. His Beloved.

He had been determined not to pick sides in this war; he enjoyed fighting, but not as much as he did  _ not _ enjoy the wrath of  _ any _ of his sisters, or of his mother. But this changes things. Not even Zeus can stop him from fighting alongside his Beloved. Not when he has been given another chance.

He goes through the Trojan barracks, slowly walking with all the regality fitting of his stature, resisting the urge to break into a sprint.

Cheers follow in his wake. The god of war has chosen their side; they are sure to win. He does not have the heart or inclination to tell them that there were to be no winners in this war (only him).

He finds his Champion on the walls overlooking on one side the city, and on the other, the battlefield, watching his soldiers share in the gossip and commotion that Ares' arrival has sparked.

For all that Ares had rushed to see him, he hadn’t planned for what he’d actually  _ do _ once he did. He settles for a simple “Welcome to Troy.”   _ Hello, again. _

“It  _ is  _ quite beautiful,” he replies. 

Ares had never quite stopped and looked at the city in that way before, even from his superior vantage point in Olympus. Now he does, and it feels like he opens his eyes to a sharper, more focused view. The prolonged siege by the Greeks has laid waste to the surrounding areas, but life went on for those inside the walls. The aiding armies, too, added a vitality to the city that wasn’t there before. So many different people, from so many different places, interacting in the small space. It was a living, breathing thing, despite being surrounded by death, and it was beautiful.

Ares turns back and watches his Champion take Troy in with all the curiosity and wonder he’s always had. And then their eyes meet, and Ares feels like he’s coming home.

"Is it true that you are the war god?" he asks, and then suddenly the world that had seemed to move in slow motion from the moment his Champion walked through the Trojan gates accelerates back to full velocity, hitting Ares like a speeding chariot. The blow is deeper, more painful, than any he has received in battle.

They did not remember. Doubt blossoms in the back of his head, cold and dark. Was this just somebody who wore the face of his Champion? Was this just a trick of the Fates?

Somehow, he brings himself to reply: "I am."

"Gods are very different, where I'm from." Memnon catches himself. "No disrespect to you, of course."

"No, no, of course. I have met your gods, too. They are noble, themselves."

He inclines his head in humble thanks. "I must say, I enjoy Trojan hospitality. Sending their god to greet a simple visiting warrior?"

"Well, you don't know. This might be a test."

"Is it?" he asks, dark eyes sparkling in challenge.

An idea pops into Ares’ head. Maybe it could be. "Would you like to spar?"

It becomes much more of a spectacle than Ares would have liked. The city was teeming with soldiers, and so their walk to the training grounds does not go unnoticed, and it seems that word moved fast. A small crowd was already gathered, waiting for them, when they get there.

Memnon picks a couple of training staves, testing out their weight and balance. Ares had been expecting hand-to-hand, but he can roll with this. He takes a staff himself, one of the bigger, heavier ones, to take the place of his axe.

“Ready?” Ares asks.

Memnon assumes a battle stance, and nods.

The crowd quiets. Ares and Memnon circle around each other, waiting each other out, testing for openings with a few tentative strikes. 

And then Ares gets tired of that, and attacks with all of his momentum. Memnon quickly redirects it with one stave and uses the other to counter-attack.

Memnon is a striker, his quick, precise blows designed to efficiently disable an opponent without using much strength. It’s a style Ares knows of, but isn’t used to, and he finds himself on the defensive more often than not, with a few half-hearted attacks, gauging the response and learning how he moves.

Memnon keeps his blows light because, well, it was just a sparring match, but Ares isn’t satisfied with that. He goads him into putting more force behind his movements by leaving obvious openings, even sometimes outright taunting him; it’s not like any blow from a human could truly hurt him.

To his credit, Memnon keeps focused, not taking his obvious bait. He’s  _ good _ .

The taunting comes back to bite Ares. A sloppy attack allows Memnon to disarm him off a block, Ares’ staff dropping to the damp earth with a dull thud. The crowd gasps.

Ares grins. Never in a long time has he felt so  _ alive _ .

Again they explode in a flurry of movement, Ares using his superior strength to neutralize the longer range Memnon’s staves afforded him.

He disarms him, too, taking away both staves in one twist. The crowd cheers.

Ares echoes them, and tosses the staves aside.

And then he charges. Memnon, well,  _ yelps _ , and dodges, and  _ this _ is Ares’ arena, now, a full-on dirty fight on the ground. Memnon does his best, but soon enough Ares has him caught in a keylock. 

Memnon raises his index finger, signalling the end of the fight. 

Ares eases on his weight and releases Memnon’s arm. Memnon lays there a moment, regaining his breath. "So, did I pass the test?"

Ares stands up and offers his hand, but Memnon refuses it and pushes himself off the ground himself. He stumbles a bit, and Ares steadies him with a gentle hand to the waist. “With flying colors."

 

Later that evening the entire Trojan camp is enjoined to a big banquet in honor of their new guests. 

News of earlier that afternoon had travelled by then, and everyone was eager to hear the stories of the man who managed to disarm a god.

“We are truly fortunate,” King Priam declares, “to have such a hero as you on our side. You will save us all.”

Memnon coughs. “I do hope that my strength will be seen in battle.”

“And humble, too!” Priam slings a wine-weighted arm over Memnon’s shoulders. Then he leans in and whispers in low tones. “It is unfortunate that you did not get the chance to meet my eldest son. But no matter. With your aid, we are sure to win, and his death avenged.”

Memnon offers a tight smile and raises his glass in a small cheers.

Priam sees the gesture and decides to bring it the whole way. He stands up and declares to the entire room, “To winning this war!”

Cheers break out. “To Troy! To victory!”

And the revelling continues, the entire hall taken over by good food and good wine. Only Ares sees the grave expression on the face of his Champion.

 

On the battlefield, Ares and Memnon are unstoppable, moving in deadly concert, and all but the bravest of the Greeks learn to give them a wide berth. This was a union of legends.

Even during the increasingly rare lulls in fighting, they are often found together. Sometimes, when the battle went well and they still had excess adrenaline thrumming under their skin, they’d spar, and Memnon gets better at keeping his balance, while Ares picks up new techniques to use with his axe. Other times, the battle goes sideways, and they patch each other up after, Memnon quietly mourning the soldiers he had lost. All too often, though, they walk the city inside the walls, and discover the beauty it hides. The wall itself becomes their place. They would watch life from their bird’s eye view from the edge of peace and war.

It reminds him of what he’s fighting for, Memnon would say.

If the Trojans find it suspicious that Ares spends all of his time with a foreign warrior king, both on and off the battlefield, they dare not say anything about it.

Said king, however,  has no such qualms. They’re sitting on the top of the wall, watching Troy, when he brings it up. "Why do you not spend more time with the Trojans?," he asks.

It was a question asked in jest more than anything, and Ares lets the question hang for a moment, considering it. "Why do you fight? This is not your war."

Ares thinks Memnon might ignore his question in turn, but after a moment he speaks, his eyes still glued to the horizon but ablaze with his Champion’s immortal spirit. "I have a duty; our kingdom made a promise, and it is only right by my people that I keep it. What good is a king who cannot stand by his word?" 

Then he shakes his head and laughs. He gives Ares’ shoulder a playful punch. "Don't think I didn't notice you dodge  _ my _ question."

"Would you be surprised if I said I think you the worthiest man in this army?"

"More skeptical than surprised, I'd say."

"I think you the worthiest man in this army."

"Well, you are mistaken. Among my people alone, I can name many far worthier than me." He starts rubbing the stones of the wall beneath his fingers, the only gesture of frustration he allows himself to show as he still maintains the pretense of levity. "I am only a king by birth; I did not earn any of this."

"Your people followed you happily to fight a war you all have no stakes in, because you said it was the right thing to do. Surely that must tell you something.” What is obvious to gods, Ares well knows, is not always obvious to humans, even ones like his Champion.

"The others,” Ares continues, “they are here for glory, or to prove themselves, or simply because they love the fight. Foolish, really.  But you’re different.  You hate it, but you are ready to fight to the death, because you believe in what you are fighting for. "

“Aren’t  _ you _ supposed to  _ want _ people to love the fight?”

“They love war because they don’t know it, not really; not like you do.”

Memnon flashes a weak grin, and Ares is surprised by the cynicism it held. “You give me too much credit.”

“You don’t give yourself enough.”

Memnon closes his eyes and tips his head back, as if all this pained him. Ares doesn’t understand; was that really how his Champion viewed themselves? How can one so brave, so loyal, so  _ good _ , believe themselves to be anything but? "You sure do know a lot about me."

"Am I wrong?"

“I  don’t want you to be,” he admits softly, before finally meeting Ares’ gaze.

Ares wants to tell him. He wants to tell him that he wasn’t, that he  _ knew  _ all this to be true, from all the battles they had fought together, from all the wars they had won. He wants to tell him that they knew each other by the soul, that their bond was one that has already conquered death. He wants to tell him that he is, and always will be, his Champion.

Ares gazes into his eyes, and sees  _ them _ , his Champion, gazing back. He’s about to say it all, but then, unexpectedly, his Champion leans in, and kisses him.

It’s tentative, a quick brush of the lips, but it’s enough to send a shiver down Ares’ spine. 

His Champion draws back, eyes unfocused for a few seconds before it all seems to dawn on him, and his entire body tenses up, getting ready to bolt. Before he can do something unnecessary like apologize, Ares closes their distance again.

It takes a second of Ares fearing he has made a horrible mistake, but Memnon melts into the kiss, and Ares takes the chance to deepen it. He pulls Memnon close, cradling his head with his hand, and hangs on for dear life, because he was not letting his Champion be taken away from him again. Not when he was getting a second chance. 

He pours everything into it--their past and their present; the joy of fighting beside them; the pain of losing them, all those years ago.

Memnon pulls back a millimeter, blinking dazedly. “You’re a  _ god _ .”

“That good?”

That startles a laugh out of Memnon. He leans his forehead on Ares’. Their breaths intermingle, and it’s more sweet and intoxicating than any Olympian ambrosia. “What are we doing?

_ Making up for lost time,  _ Ares doesn’t answer. Instead, he just kisses him again.

 

Logically, Ares knows that, his Champion being mortal, they can never have forever. He  _ knows _ that.

But he is the God of War, and he is fighting alongside his Champion. This was their second chance, and he figured that it was to be their happily ever after. He thought they’d have years,  _ decades _ , of being happy. Sure, Ares would have to watch him grow old and gray, but that was something to worry about when it happened. In the meantime,though, he thought they had all the time in the world. 

He doesn’t get that, in the end.

Antilochus is one of the few Greeks brave enough to face Memnon in battle, and for that he falls. His father seeks vengeance, but Memnon, ever honorable, refuses to fight an old man.

And thus it falls to Achilles to avenge his friend.

Everyone else in the battlefield feels a deep tiredness, and stops fighting in favor of watching them fight. Meanwhile, Ares finds himself yanked from Troy back into Olympus.

“Let me go back!” he pleads, because he knows of Achilles’ dip in the River, and he trusts in the skill of his Champion, but this is one advantage he cannot overcome.

“What is the problem, son?,” Zeus asks, and not for the first time Ares feels pure festering hatred against his father. “Is this not the highlight of this entire war? Is this not the entire reason for your existence? No. There will be no interference.”

And so Ares can only watch in horror, amidst the joyous whoops of his father, as the two best warriors of their time face off.

He sees Memnon use tricks he taught him and holding his own against his invincible opponent, and a tight hope grows deep in his stomach. Achilles may have an unfair advantage, but Memnon is his Champion; he’ll win.

And then Achilles stabs him straight in the chest, and it’s Ares’ heart that breaks.

The blood rushing to his ears is not enough to cover Zeus’ token groan of disappointment. Any rage he might have felt over that, though, is drowned out by his anguish.

Ares tears his way from Olympus to the battlefield. The Trojans are retreating, their last hope already fallen, but even they spare a sorry glance at Ares and their fallen hero.

Ares holds Memnon through his last moments, and he wonders if this was always to be their fate.

 

The next time they meet, it’s in a battlefield in a young Wakanda, when it was still an upstart kingdom born in the middle of the jungle. His Champion is part of the King’s elite guard.  

She dies taking a fatal hit for her King.

He thinks this is probably Aphrodite's way of toying with him.

Again and again, his Champion comes back-- a  soldier who defects and dies fighting for those they were sent to conquer; a pilot who dies protecting others who thought them not good enough to fight alongside them ; a warrior who fights with wit and pen more than force, and is still killed for it; a soldier already free from the war, but who comes back to save their friends.

Again and again, he watches them die in battle, at the hands foes Ares cannot protect them from.

And Ares grows more bitter with age, as the immortal are prone to do. Fighting becomes more about the violence and less about the fight. After all, what use was a cause, if it cannot save you?

 

When Osborn tells him to take on   _ War Machine _ , he expects it to be a quick and easy job. What, after all, was a War Machine to the War God?

And then he sees the file about the  _ incident _ in Santo Marco and it’s  _ them _ , and he realizes: an offering. His Champion had turned himself to the ultimate weapon. He was more than human, now, and Ares’ chest swells with pride. This was his Champion finally proclaiming to the world what Ares has always known, even if his Champion had denied it time and time again--they were equals, the two of them. They were the same.

They still fight in sync, bodies moving in some remembered coordination from all their lifetimes together, even if Rhodey is not aware of the reason why. It’s glorious, and Ares never wants it to end.

It’s foolhardy of him to release the Ultimo virus, putting everyone around them in jeopardy, but--he  _ missed _ this. He missed fighting alongside his Champion. If he had to create the enemy himself to be able to do it, then so be it.

It all comes to a head in the aftermath. Ares tries to strike up the conversation, get their normal  rapport even outside of battle going, but Rhodey proves resistant. “I’m not your Champion,” he maintains, displeased at Ares’ lack of concern for the people he might have hurt in his antics.

Ares should have known, really. 

 

Nothing disappoints him more than when Rhodey loses his fight. All the lifetimes they have known each other, and this is the first time that has ever happened.

They always went down fighting, his Champion, and it’s something he loved and hated in equal measure. They wouldn’t be  _ them _ if they didn’t.

But Rhodey lets himself just  _ give up _ . Often, his Champion had rallied against a corrupt system, but never have they allowed themselves completely at its mercy. It didn’t sit right with Ares. His Champion  _ always _ fought for justice, and Ares will not allow this trend to be broken, even if he has to go and force them to himself.

It’s only right.

"I'm here to save you," Ares declares, and he should have known that that could only be a portent of doom. He has failed to save them all those times before.

He fails again. Rhodey runs headfirst into an explosion to save a child and Ares isn't even aware of his shouted 'no.' Again all the wounds from all the lives he's seen his beloved lose reopen, because  _ no not again I do not want to see this again _ .

But he does, and for perhaps the first time in all their lifetimes, he feels like he doesn't deserve to grieve. His mother cradles his body, the boy he sacrificed his life for beside her, and Ares keeps his distance, even as he relives a hundred remembered heartbreaks. He’s had his mourning so many times before. He lets them have theirs in peace.

At the same time, he’s proud that his Champion got his fight back, in the end.

Later, when he hears (from a ranting Osborn) that Rhodey survived, that he was saved by his planning and his technology and his friends, Ares breathes a sigh of relief, but the weight in his bones doesn't lift. Once again, he had failed them. And he had no right to Rhodey; he had made it very clear that he wanted nothing to do with him.

Maybe  _ this  _ was Aphrodite's trick. His Champion surviving in the lifetime that they weren't even friends.

He stays away.

 

Ares dies and through circuitous means comes back and he's a pub somewhere in the west of England when he hears the news.

His Champion is dead.

The irony is choking; he had been taken from the Elysian Fields just when Rhodey would have arrived there. Even in death, they keep missing their time.

He raises his glass in a silent toast to his Champion, and finishes off his drink in one long gulp. The cheap beer wasn’t the Olympian ambrosia the occasion deserved, but it will do. Rhodey had died a brave warrior's death, as they had in all their other lifetimes. Fitting, for his Champion.

They'll come back.  They always come back.  Ares can wait.

Except--

Technically, Ares  _ is _ dead. His resurrection was an anomaly, a deviation from what the Fates intended. He should be allowed passage back to the Elysian Fields.

He stands up abruptly, his chair clattering to the floor. The bartender eyes him dirtily, so Ares attempts an apologetic smile, picks the chair up, and pushes it back into place.

He had a journey to make.

 

Rhodey wakes up, and his first thought is  _ I’ve been here before. _

His second thought is  _ where, exactly, is here? _

“Elysium,” a voice answers from somewhere above him, and it occurs to Rhodey that perhaps he had said all of that out loud. “Hades. The Afterlife.”

Somebody else crouches down to nearer his level, lying on the grass. “Welcome back, kid,” she says. “Come, we feast, and you tell us of all the adventures you’ve had in this past life.”

It’s all very  _ odd _ , but Rhodey has always lived with odd for most of his life (he’s best friends with Tony fucking Stark, after all), maybe even secretly enjoys odd, so he goes with it. He tells them of meeting a metal man in a warzone, of getting sucked into said metal man’s crazy life, of becoming a metal man himself, and he finds that he’s enjoying himself as he relives old times.

He gets to his stint in red, white, and blue when a thought occurs to him.

“Wait, so this is the Afterlife, yeah?”

“This is Elysium; you are correct.”

“Would any of you happen to, um, know a Terrence Rhodes?”

“Your father?” somebody asks, in sympathy. Rhodey nods.

“Not unless he believed in the Greek and Roman Gods. It’s the arrangement; Pluto gets those who believe in him.”

And for all that this day (has it only been a day? Or has it been longer?) has been odd, that was perhaps the most mystifying thing about it. “But-- _ I _ don’t believe. I’m a Baptist from Philly.”

Rhodey didn’t think a meaningful look could be shared throughout one whole banquet table, but it happens. One of them speaks up: “Maybe not in this life. Wait on it. You’ll remember soon enough.”

They’re right. Time doesn’t mean a lot in Elysium, but slowly, he does remember. It comes back slowly, a slow trickle of random scenes from all throughout history, until he is nothing but a jagged puzzle of hundreds of lives.

The common thread, he finds, is Ares. He remembers fighting him, fighting alongside him, baring his soul to him,  even--

He’s not sure what to do with it all. It’s theirs, they know it is, but--

The others introduce him to Ares’ son Phobos and something inside them--him--is illogically jealous, but another part wants to learn as much as he can about Ares, to make sense of the fragments he has.

Phobos doesn’t have the answers, not really, but they share stories of Ares, and of their lives, and it’s not hard to see how this place is mistaken for heaven.

Soon, a lifetime later, Ares himself returns.

If he is surprised at Rhodey and Phobos hanging out with each other, he doesn’t say. Instead, he greets them.  “My son,” he says to Phobos and, “My Champion,” he says to Rhodey.  This time, Rhodey does not deny it.

“I--I remember.”

Rhodey doesn’t mean to blurt it out, but then again, what other way was there to say it? 

Distantly, he registers Phobos look between him and Ares and decide that the conversation is not for him. He asks for leave, and Ares absentmindedly ruffles his hair before he saunters off to enjoy paradise.

“Not--not  _ all _ of it,” he continues. “There’s bits and pieces, and they’re still coming in, but--I remember enough. You knew each time?”

“Yes.”

“How come you never told me?”

Ares raises an eyebrow.

“Good point. But hey,” Rhodey says, with a friendly punch to Ares’ shoulder, “we have an eternity in paradise now to make up for lost time, right? I want to remember. All of it.”

He doesn’t know what reaction he expected from Ares, but quiet and somber was not exactly it.

“There’s something you should know.” Ares braces himself because he knows his Champion and cannot imagine him taking this well. ”After you--”

He takes a deep breath and tries again. ”The superhero community is divided. Hawkeye is on trial for killing the Hulk--”

“Wait,  _ what _ ?”

“--and Iron Man and Captain Marvel are fighting. They’re already calling it another Civil War.”

Rhodey is torn between horror and a tired  _ exasperation _ . He was just gone for--and then there it is again, time slipping past his fingers--

“Wait, how long have I been gone?”

“Truthfully, I do not know either. I have been in Hades for a while, too. I have bought your safe passage back to the mortal world from Pluto.”

“How?”

“Let’s just say that he owes me--reparations.”

“How about you?”

“He’s happy here. I think, as long as he is, we’re staying.”

Rhodey follows Ares’ gaze and watches Phobos laying satisfied on the soft grass. They’ve only known each other briefly, really--at least, he thinks so--but already he feels a protectiveness over him. “He’s a good kid.”

“He is.”

“When, if, I go back--will I forget everything again?”

Ares is somber. “I don’t know.”

“I don’t think I can choose,” Rhodey says, but even as he says it, he knows it’s a lie. The memories, all those past lives--somehow, they aren’t truly  _ his _ . Maybe some more time would have changed that, would have completed the puzzle, but he’s been Carol’s--he’s been with Carol for a few years, and Tony’s best friend for some more, and he knows that Tony and Carol have been friends nearly as long. There was something deeply wrong, and he knew he can fix it. He can’t not. There is an almost maddening  pull to Ares, but the pull to  _ them _ \--to the friends and family he’s left behind--is somehow stronger.

Ares tears his eyes away from his son and looks at Rhodey, the smile on his lips not quite reaching his eyes, as if he already knows all of this. “Do not worry, my Champion. One day, we will have eternity.”

And Rhodey can only imagine how Ares must feel, to finally have this and to willingly give it up. Rhodey doesn’t have all the pieces, not yet--maybe not ever in this lifetime--but even he finds this goodbye difficult. Something inside tells him  _ no _ , tells him  _ stay _ .  _ This is where we belong _ , it says, and Rhodey wants so much to give in. 

Instead, he brings his hand up to Ares’ cheek, a wordless  _ thank you _ . Ares leans into his warmth, eyes never leaving his.

Rhodey musters up all his determination. “One day. I promise.”

He seals it with a kiss, a soft brush of the lips, and for the briefest, most intoxicating moment, the puzzle pieces slot into place. This is who they are, who they always will be: Ares’ Champion.  _ Beloved. _

And it’s not eternity, not yet, but it’s pretty close.


End file.
